


His Queen of Love and Beauty

by WickedLilThing



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Arranged Marriage, Cannon Divergent, F/M, Get Together, Post-The Battle of the Blackwater
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-19
Updated: 2019-04-19
Packaged: 2020-01-16 12:31:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,796
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18521575
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WickedLilThing/pseuds/WickedLilThing
Summary: Sandor never left the battlefield at the Battle of the Blackwater.  He stayed for one reason and she still needs him.  The two become friendly but Joffrey has other plans.





	His Queen of Love and Beauty

“It’s cold. Little Birds should be in their cages, not on battlement walls in the wind.” Sandor said as he walk out of the shadows. She turned to look at him. “Can’t sleep?” She nodded. He clenched his teeth and balled his fist. She’d taken another beating days before for another one of her brother’s wins. Her back was opened and he hadn’t been there. He felt his blood boil at the thought of her in pain and he had been unable to do anything. For the last few days, the woman had been locked away in her room recovering. He’d pass her door twice a day and could hear her whimpering. It haunted him all day and night. He knocked on her door but she never answered. The maids had whispered that she needed her wounds stitched back together after the whipping. “I should have been there.” He said softly, moving closer to her. 

“You could have done nothing. He would have killed you if you tried to help me.” She said darkly. The young woman sighed and moved to sit on the edge of the wall, her back to the cold wind. Sandor didn’t miss the limp in her left leg. 

“Why are you limping?” He asked her. She didn’t answer, didn’t meet his eyes. “Tell me, girl.”

“Trant threw me down the stairs of the great hall.” She replied. Rage flared up in him. 

“That worthless, craven cunt!” He shouted. “Let me see your leg.” There was hesitation and he just lifted up her skirt himself. “Seven hells…” Her left knee was swollen and bruised. No high born lady should ever have that happen to her. “This happened days ago. How bad was it when it happened?” She turned her head, hair hiding her face. 

“I thought I would never walk properly again.” She confessed. He was going to mutilate Trant until he couldn’t walk. 

“It needs to be bound.” He told her and she finally looked up. 

“Does it? My maids—”

“Aye, your maids don’t know any better.” If they didn’t know any better, he wondered who cleaned and stitched up her back. “Who treated your back?” She shook her head. “What?” He practically growled. “No one has seen to your back?” Another shake of the head. 

“They covered it in bandages. It wasn’t proper care.” She told him. He looked at her, taking in her pale, clammy skin and sunken eyes. 

“I’m taking you to someone who can treat them. Someone who will keep silent.” He told her and picked her up—gently, careful of her back—and carried her into the city. 

“You don’t have to.” She protested weakly. 

“Aye, I don’t but I’m going to.” He told her.

 

He carried her to a small building not too far from the Red Keep. A knock and several gold dragons later and a man not much older than Sandor was treating her wounds. The man, Lucas, instructed her to sit on a table in the light of a mirrored lamp. 

“Now, my lady, you’ll need to remove your dress from your back.” She looked up Sandor, hesitantly. He nodded. 

“We can trust him.” He told her. The man wasn’t a maester but treated wounds twice as well as any Sandor had the displeasure of meeting. The Kingsguard and Gold Cloaks all came to him when they were in need and he never talked, treating everything from infections obtained from brothels to a knife to the gut without a single word to any other living soul. 

“Could you…I mean…” The redhead blushed but he caught her meaning and went to stand behind her as she disrobed. He could hear the sucking sound of the blood and puss on her back as Lucas removed the bandages. He winched when he saw her back. It was bad. Bile rose up with the rage welling inside him. Her back looked like a lion mauled her half to death. Under her newest wounds were a criss-crossing of older scars from Trant’s sword and another whipping. Her flesh was brutalized. He wondered what other wounds he didn’t know about and swore he would never leave her at court alone again. 

“Seven Hells, Little Bird.” He wanted to reach out, to touch her, but her back was so raw he didn’t dare. 

“I can treat it, but you should have come to me sooner.” Lucas said with a click of his tongue. He move to pick up a bowl of strong alcohol and a clean rag. “This is going to sting but I have to do this if you don’t want infection.” She nodded and whimpered at every pass of the rag. As he was reaching the middle of the back, towards the deepest and more infected wounds, Sansa reached out for Sandor’s hand. He was more than surprised the Little Bird touched him without so much as a second thought. 

Then Lucas gave them the news they knew was coming. She’d need her wounds stitched up. After cleaning the wounds, he gently laid down a layer of ointment that would numb the pain. She was directed to lay on her stomach and Sandor sat down next to her, avoiding watching him work. 

“Can you feel it?” He asked when she winched. 

“I can feel pressure. It doesn’t hurt. It’s strange.” She told him. “Thank you for taking me here. It already feels better.” 

“I don’t need your chirping, Little Bird.” He warned her. She frowned deeply at him. Her blue eyes glassy.

“I’m not chirping. I’m truly grateful. No one gives me a second thought. No one but you.” She looked into his eyes as she said it. He could see she was being honest. He was beginning to see the real woman behind that chirping. The honesty behind the lies she spun for the boy king. He wondered if he was the only person who knew this side of her. “No one took care of me for days. I tried my best to keep it from getting infected but there isn’t much I could do on my own.” She let out a deep breath, her burden lifting a bit under Lucas’ care. “I haven’t slept for days.” 

“Go to sleep, Little Bird. I’ll put you back in your cage." Sansa laid her head in her folded arms and slipped off to sleep. Sandor relaxed himself and watched the woman sleep. 

 

Sansa was left alone in her room for over a week. No one dared to talk to her, to seek her out, she was the biggest pariah in the city. During those long days Sandor would pass her door and check her wounds. After the ninth day, he took her to Lucas to have the stitches removed. He kept his eyes on the wounds—not daring to let his eyes stray or his mind wander, not wanting to add any more of a burden on her—and checked that the deepest cuts were healing. She’d have long, angry scars on her back for the rest of her life but at least she wouldn’t be a cripple from the wounds or infection. She’d ask him about his day, every time he came to see her. 

“Again? What do you want to know? Who I saw taking a boy behind the stables? Who owes who money? What the Tyrell bitch wore? Who the bastard king tormented today? I slept, I ate, I trained, I guarded the king, I came to see you, and after I see you I’m going to drink myself to sleep.” He snapped at her. Her jaw set and her blue eyes were glossy with tears. He immediately regretted snapping at the girl. The girl sprung up and she barely grabbed the front of her dress in time to save her virtue. 

“I’m locked up here all day! Every day! With nothing to do! No books to read. Nothing to sew. No correspondence. No one to talk to but my handmaid! Who’s a spy for the queen! I’m going to go mad!” She nearly shouted at him. “Get out if you’re just going to make it worse! Don’t mock me!” 

“Little Bird—” He tried to protest, reaching out to her, but she pulled away. 

“Get out!” She shouted at him through frustrated tears. She was angry and he regretted his short temper, but he couldn’t deny that she was absolutely beautiful when she was angry. 

“Little Bird, I wasn’t thinking.” He told her. “Sit down so I can finish.” Sandor wrapped his large hand around her arm, gently. “You’re wanted at court tomorrow.” He didn’t want to think about what the shit king wanted to do to her tomorrow. Have her whipped again, hit, broken. His worst nightmare was that she would be brutalized horribly while he wasn’t there. He had nightmares of her being executed and he could nothing about it. He couldn’t say goodbye or even see her one last time, only see her face rotting on a pike. Reminding him of how he failed her.

“What?” She asked, a grim look on her sweet face. “Isn’t court preparing for the wedding and tournament?” In honor of his wedding to the Tyrell girl, the bastard king had decided he wanted a tournament in their name. Much to the disapproval of the Hand of the King but much of the expenses were being paid for by the Tyrells. 

“Yes. I don’t know what he has planned but he’s giddy with it.” He told her. Realization dawned on her. 

“That’s why you didn’t want to talk about today.” The conversation lulled and she let him rub the ointment into her skin and checked her knee. The knee was slow healing and worried him. She could move better than before and the swelling had gone down. He was worried the damage was permanent but Lucas told him there was nothing to worry about. The only medicine she needed was a proper diet and that was hard to find for her. The bastard king neglected her to the point where Sandor could see each notch in her spine and count her ribs.

“Your back is healing nicely. It will scar, but you’ll be able to move your back naturally.” She shivered as he traced one of the thiner wounds that already healed. He wondered if another man had ever touched this skin so gently or made her shiver like that. He wanted to touch more of her, see her reaction, claim her. He wondered if anymore of her flesh was as pink as the new scar. He stood up suddenly. “Get some sleep.” He said and walked to the door in three long strides. 

“G—good night.” He heard her say as he closed the door.


End file.
